On to the current issue. This is absurd and sooo misguided. I have never battled obesity but even from my vantage point I really doubt that this legislation will bring about any positive changes to the obesity problem this country is certianbly facing. There is certianly a major issue no doubt about that. But this is NOT te way to address it. It is blatant discrimmination and it’s absurd.

Oh BTW to the poster who siad eating helthy is more expensive that is a fallacy. By the time you purchase subway, McDonalds, etc you could have easily bought healthy food at the market and prepared it at home for an equal cost and maybe even less. My husband and I did an experiment to prove this and foudn that while organic food can significantly drive up the price it is always cheaper to make healthy food at hime than to buy fast food. If you take into account the cost of healthcare needed as a result of the poor eating you are way way ahead eating at home. It takes a litle planning and effort but in the long run it pays off big time to eat at home- both to your health and your pocket book. I am not naive enough to think that changing your eating habits would fix the problem for all people struggling wiht obesity but if you are talking about eating 10 mini burgers then I would say changing your eating habits would defintely be the place to start. Soe poeple do have physolgical reasons why the are overweight but there is also a tremndous portion of hte population that just plain doesn’t take responsibility for their eating. IN my opinion a better way to impact the obesity issue would be to severly restrict fast food – their advertising, menus, maybe even their existence. But that would be like not selling cigarettes so I’m not suggesting it is a viable option. I do think that fast food is a major problem and if you are eating it you really have no one to blame but yourself for obesity- there is almost nothing on a ast food menu that is healthy. Even the fruit salad has candied walnuts on it and hthe chicken sandwiches are usually fried (the grilled ones are not healthy due to the chemicals on tehm but not too fatty). It’s a shortcut that really doesn’t pay. I think it’s an individuls choice to eat that stuff- a little Darwinian thinning of the herd. We have too mmany people anyhow so I guess those who choose to ought to keep on smoking and eating fast food- just don’t blow the smoke my way or ask me to put that stuff in my mouth.

Also, the principle behind this legislation isn’t terribly clear to me: it would seem to me that the logical extension would be to prohibit ANYONE to give ANY food or drink to an obese person, whether by sale or gift. If a restaurant can not serve food to an obese person, then why can they DELIVER food to the home of an obese person (as a pizza parlor)? And if that, too, is prohibited, then it suggests that a delivery boy, after applying a body-mass measuring pincer to a customer who answers the door, is called upon to make a diagnosis of obesity and, based on this diagnosis, either take his pizza back to the restaurant (presumably to be thrown out), or else, put the owner in danger of losing his license. Of course, there should be a fine, I think, imposed on the obese person who placed an order, knowing it was illegal for him to eat: after all, he’s contributing to global warming by having the diagnostician drive there in vain with a pizza that has to be thrown out.

Of course, the REAL problem is that restaurants have to apply to the state for a permit from the state department of health, in the first place.

However, if Mississippi voters see fit to put utter idiots like that inside the legislature, then I don’t think obesity is their biggest problem.

Might we not have a law prohibiting restaurants from serving people with low I.Q.’s?

As for me, I just checked it, and I have a BMI of 30.2. So I guess I’ll have to lose a few pounds if I want to eat there…

“The whole smoking issue about privately-owned business is not about smoking as much as it is about government control. Publicly-owned facilities should be non-smoking. But privately-owned businesses should be able to make their own decisions. The public does not have to patronize or work at private businesses except by choice. And by allowing this, the government will be able to tell every business owner what he or she can or cannot do. Incredible!

Since obesity is the No. 1 health issue in America, perhaps the government can declare that obese people may not patronize restaurants. I can’t believe that every bar and restaurant owner in America hasn’t banded together to fight the legality of this kind of control.

Sharon Coppens
Mishawaka”

“There was a classic clash of diametrically opposing views regarding government’s role in the private lives of Americans on the Jan. 11 editorial page of The Tribune. Sharon Coppens of Mishawaka wrote a letter to the editor berating the wide-ranging restrictions on smoking now imposed on our residents who choose to smoke. Prophetically, she said the next government target would be obesity, where “perhaps the government can declare that obese people may not patronize restaurants.”

On the other side of the issue, the Michiana Point of View contributor that day, Dr. Richard Feldman of Indianapolis, wrote “… the public believes that government should take an active role in combating obesity as a high budget priority. Federal and state governments must create an appropriate financial and organizational effort … .”

No, the public does not believe that more tax dollars and institutional bureaucracies should be created to fight obesity. Each individual is accountable for his own health, and the nanny government must not encroach further on our freedom of choice. If there is to be a movement to make us more healthy it should be a self-educated cultural and social awareness, not a dependency on government. Let’s get the government on track and off our backs. No more! Enough!

Arthur J. Balfour
Dowagiac”

The timing of this entry on your blog is amazing. Needless to say, I must respond to these letters. This is just too good. Thanks, by the way, for clueing us in.

1) Wasn’t obesity one of the recent additions or attempted additions to the ADA’s target group, meaning you couldn’t discriminate against fat people?

2) Just because someone eats fruits and vegetables doesn’t mean they will eat healthier; it just means it will be more expensive. As a fat man, I can eat a large pizza or 10 mini-burgers or 2 feet of Subway subs. Does anyone think I couldn’t eat 15 oranges if I happened to care for the hassle of eating them?

By the way, I am trying to remember what movie it was, but there was a scene at the end where an old lady is throwing chairs out the window when she is told to leave a buffet place after eating for 3 hours. I can picture it now. A fat guy told he can’t eat at a restaurant goes postal and destroys the place. Guess Denny’s will need to hire bouncers now.

This is were we are heading. One just needs to look at the UK’s NHS ideas.

The irony of it all… First a vote to remove someone else’s rights and in the end it affects you too! Wake up people!!